Roy Keane continues to believe one win will turn around Ipswich's season, but failure to beat Nottingham Forest means the Irishman has now overseen Town's longest winless start to a league season for 40 years.

He will take some comfort from the fact the man whose unfortunate record he has now matched was Bobby Robson, whose first full season in charge at Portman Road saw the Suffolk club take eight matches before recording a victory, but with matches against Newcastle and Sheffield United to follow, Keane will surely be desperately hoping the duck is broken at Doncaster on Saturday.

Not that he gave that impression after a match which Ipswich, having scored in the first minute, very nearly lost in the last, when the defender Gareth McAuley had to foul the Forest forward Dele Adebola as he bore down on goal, an offence for which the centre-half was sent off. "We're nearly there, nearly there, although nearly never makes it sometimes," Keane mused. "But we'll be alright, I was encouraged by what I saw. I'm pretty sure I'll sleep well."

Carlos Edwards and Grant Leadbitter, the latest of several acquisitions that Keane has made from former club Sunderland, both retained their places after making their debuts in the defeat at Middlesbrough on Saturday, and they wasted no time in making a favourable impression on the home supporters.

Barely 40 seconds of the game had passed when Jon Stead - another former Sunderland player, albeit via Sheffield United - got his head to Edwards's throw from the right touchline, glancing the ball back across the penalty area for Leadbitter, arriving late and unaccompanied, to place a simple volley beyond Forest's goalkeeper Lee Camp.

While Ipswich continued to enjoy the majority of possession thereafter, there were few signs they could create a second, and the home team's nerves began to jangle early in the second half, when Alex Bruce misjudged an attempted headed clearance and clearly appeared to handle the ball in the process. Ipswich got away with that one, but sensing the shift in momentum, Forest's manager, Billy Davies, sent on Robert Earnshaw.

Like Edwards and Leadbitter before him, the Wales forward made an instant impact. His first touch, less than 10 seconds after coming on, was to play a simple pass into the feet of Adebola on the edge of the penalty area; his second took the return past a lunging defender; his third steered the ball beyond Richard Wright.

Leadbitter's determination to keep driving his new team forward was admirable, and with five minutes remaining Town almost snatched a winner when McAuley's header was kicked off the line.

The defender's fortune worsened soon afterwards, when he rightly saw red, though as the subsequent free-kick was blocked, no doubt his sacrifice will have been considered worthwhile, despite all the boos that greeted the final whistle.

"This is a good point, because there are some very good players here. Roy Keane and his staff will get it right," said Davies.